Head of Ohio's teacher pension fund retires Sunday, saying fund is strong despite staff vacancies

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Head of Ohio's teacher pension fund retires Sunday, saying fund is strong despite staff vacancies

2024-11-30 04:04 Last Updated At：04:10

COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — The outgoing head of Ohio's troubled teachers retirement system said that she is leaving the fund in strong fiscal condition, despite the turmoil at the top that her successor will inherit.

In a recent interview with The Associated Press, Acting Executive Director and CFO Lynn Hoover said that the $94 billion State Teachers Retirement System of Ohio's returns over the short term, middle term and long term remain within the top 10% of peer funds around the country.

“We’ve delivered,” said Hoover, whose senior investment staff has seen reduced performance bonuses as part of recent tensions. She retires Sunday after 31 years at STRS, one of the nation’s oldest and largest public pension funds. Its more than 500,000 members include active and inactive public school teachers and retirees.

That doesn't mean the next interim director, Aaron Hood, doesn't have a big job ahead of him, she said.

The U.S. Army veteran and seasoned asset management professional came on board this month and will help the board lead a nationwide search for a new permanent director to replace Bill Neville, who was let go in September after being placed on leave amid misconduct allegations. Hood also must fill Hoover's role as chief financial officer, hire for a vacancy coming in March for a chief investment officer and find a new head of internal audit.

The top priority "is to get those filled and to get highly capable people in here that can continue this great legacy,” Hoover said.

The staff departures come amid years of tension that boiled over this spring. Would-be reformers on the STRS board took aim at the fund’s internal operations and investment decisions after retirees were angered when the previous board cut their cost-of-living adjustment and then eliminated it for five years to help stabilize the fund. Many have remained dissatisfied with the 3% adjustment they got in 2023 and the 1% adjustment they got in 2024.

In May, Republican Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine announced that he had come into possession of an anonymous 14-page memo and other documents containing “disturbing allegations” about the STRS board and was handing them over to authorities.

Republican Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost launched an investigation the next day into what he called the fund’s “susceptibility to a hostile takeover by private interests.” The probe is still ongoing, and lawmakers have since begun considering a proposal to remove some elected members from the board.

Yost followed up the launch of his investigation with a lawsuit seeking to unseat two of the reform-minded board members. One of those members, Rudy Fichtenbaum, became board chair. The other, Wade Steen, has since left the board. Yost also filed a lawsuit against two other former board members in October, alleging they participated in a “civil conspiracy” that prevented him from uncovering the fund's defects.

When the same whistleblower attorney who examined STRS' performance metrics also turned up in Minnesota to do something similar, The Blade of Toledo reported that records there showed Hoover and others communicated with their counterparts “to undermine the impact of the investigation.”

Hoover said the communications were “par for the course and normal protocol.”

“They simply reached out to us and said would you be able to get on the phone call with us,” she said. Hoover called it “pretty typical” that peer organizations will exchange information on best practices and how they have handled similar issues.

Hoover said she is proud of the staff's professionalism amid all the controversy in recent years. “The staff have stayed really aligned with the mission and laser-focused on protecting and providing member security," she said.

STRS has paid out more than $4 billion in positive benefit changes to active teachers and retirees over the past three and a half years, she said, which she attributed to sound investment strategies and strong markets.

“Our fund is in a situation where we pay out more in benefits than what we receive in contributions, so the investment returns are critical over the long term,” she said.

At the same time, she acknowledged that members have had to bear the brunt of pension reform changes and high inflation, and “it's been hard.”

Hoover said members should be happy that the fund is now reviewing cost-of-living-adjustments annually. She added that STRS is also fighting to increase employers' contributions into the fund. The percentage they pay in Ohio has remained the same for 40 years, she said.

STRS also has hired the global commercial real estate firm CBRE to analyze usage needs for its buildings, which are capital not investment assets, into the future and continues to lobby for fair school funding, she said.

The retirement system is also keeping a close eye on the rollout of Ohio's new universal voucher system, which is open to both public and private school students.

“To the extent that it starts taking kids out of public education, thereby reducing teachers, thereby reducing payroll, that does affect our system,” she said. “We want to support public education, and the public pension model is so valuable for the teacher. They've served and worked and taught our kids and, when they retire, they should have a dependable, reliable, secure monthly pension until they die.”

New LA-area fire prompts more evacuations while over 10,000 structures lost to the 2 biggest blazes

2025-01-10 11:34 Last Updated At：11:41

LOS ANGELES (AP) — The two biggest wildfires ravaging the Los Angeles area this week burned at least 10,000 homes, buildings and other structures, officials said Thursday as they urged more people to heed evacuation orders after a new blaze ignited and quickly grew.

The fast-moving Kenneth Fire started in the late afternoon in the San Fernando Valley near the West Hills neighborhood and close to Ventura County. Only hours earlier officials expressed encouragement after firefighters aided by calmer winds and help from crews from outside the state saw the first signs of successfully beating back the region’s devastating wildfires that have killed seven people so far.

“We are expecting this fire to rapidly spread due to high winds,” Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass said, echoing the forecast that called for winds to strengthen Thursday evening through Friday morning.

The orders came as Los Angeles County officials announced the Eaton Fire near Pasadena that started Tuesday night has burned more than 5,000 structures, a term that includes homes, apartment buildings, businesses, outbuildings and vehicles. To the west in Pacific Palisades, the largest of the fires burning in the LA area has destroyed over 5,300 structures.

Between the Eaton and Palisades fires, more than 10,000 structures have burned.

All of the large fires that have broken out this week in the Los Angeles area are located in a roughly 25-mile band north of downtown.

The Kenneth blaze ignited less than 2 miles (3.2 kilometers) away from the El Camino Real Charter High School, where people are sheltering from the fire in Palisades. The two fires are about 10 miles (18 kilometers) apart.

Dozens of blocks were flattened to smoldering rubble in scenic Pacific Palisades. Only the outlines of homes and their chimneys remained. In Malibu, blackened palm strands were all that was left above debris where oceanfront homes once stood.

At least five churches, a synagogue, seven schools, two libraries, boutiques, bars, restaurants, banks and groceries were lost. So too were the Will Rogers’ Western Ranch House and Topanga Ranch Motel, local landmarks dating to the 1920s. The government has not yet released figures on the cost of the damage or specifics about how many structures burned.

AccuWeather, a private company that provides data on weather and its impact, on Thursday increased its estimate of the damage and economic loss to $135-$150 billion.

Firefighters made significant gains Thursday at slowing the spread of the Eaton and Palisades fires, though Eaton remained at zero percent contained and Palisades at only a small percentage.

Crews also knocked down a blaze in the Hollywood Hills, allowing an evacuation to be lifted Thursday. The fire that sparked up late Wednesday near the heart of the entertainment industry came perilously close to igniting the famed Hollywood Bowl outdoor concert venue.

“While we are still facing significant threats, I am hopeful that the tide is turning,” Los Angeles County Supervisor Kathryn Barger said Thursday.

Water dropped from aircraft helped fire crews quickly seize control of the fires in the Hollywood Hills and Studio City, officials said. Much of the widespread destruction occurred Tuesday after those aircraft were grounded due to high winds.

Fire officials said Thursday that they don’t yet know the cause of the fires but are actively investigating.

Earlier in the week, hurricane-force winds blew embers, igniting the Southern California hillsides.

Right now, it’s impossible to quantify the extent of the destruction other than “total devastation and loss,” said Barbara Bruderlin, head of the Malibu Pacific Palisades Chamber of Commerce.

“There are areas where everything is gone, there isn’t even a stick of wood left, it’s just dirt,” Bruderlin said.

Of the seven deaths so far, Los Angeles Fire Chief Kristin Crowley confirmed two were in the Palisades Fire. County officials said the Eaton Fire had killed five.

Cadaver dogs and search crews are searching through rubble, Los Angeles County Sheriff Robert Luna said.

Anthony Mitchell, a 67-year-old amputee, and his son, Justin, who had cerebral palsy, were waiting for an ambulance to come, but they did not make it out, Mitchell’s daughter, Hajime White, told The Washington Post.

Shari Shaw told KTLA that she tried to get her 66-year-old brother, Victor Shaw, to evacuate Tuesday night but he wanted to stay and fight the fire. Crews found his body with a garden hose in his hand.

On Thursday, recovery crews pulled a body from rubble of what was a beachfront residence in Malibu on the scenic Pacific Coast Highway. A charred washer and dryer were among the few things that remained.

At least 180,000 people were under evacuation orders, and the fires have consumed about 45 square miles (117 square kilometers) — roughly the size of San Francisco. The Palisades Fire is already the most destructive in Los Angeles’ history.

All schools in the Los Angeles Unified School District, the nation’s second largest, will be closed Friday because of the heavy smoke wafting over the city and ash raining down in parts, and classes will not resume until the conditions improve, officials said.

At least 20 arrests have been made for looting, and the city of Santa Monica declared a curfew Wednesday night because of the lawlessness, officials said. Luna said to protect properties national guard troops would be stationed near the areas ravaged by fire and a curfew was expected to go into effect from 6 p.m. until 6 a.m., starting as soon as Thursday.

Flames destroyed the homes of several celebrities, including Billy Crystal, Mandy Moore and Paris Hilton.

Jamie Lee Curtis pledged $1 million to start a “fund of support” for those affected by the fires that touched all economic levels from the city’s wealthy to its working class.

California’s wildfire season is beginning earlier and ending later due to rising temperatures and decreased rainfall tied to climate change, according to recent data.

Dry winds, including the notorious Santa Anas, have contributed to warmer-than-average temperatures in Southern California, which has not seen more than 0.1 inches (2.5 millimeters) of rain since early May.

Robert Lara sifted through the remains of his home in Altadena on Thursday with tears in his eyes, hoping to find a safe containing a set of earrings that once belonged to his great-great-grandmother.

“All our memories, all our sentimental attachments, things that were gifted from generation to generation to generation are now gone,” he said.

Seewer reported from Toledo, Ohio and Watson from San Diego. Associated Press journalists Manuel Valdes, Eugene Garcia and Krysta Fauria, Jaimie Ding in Los Angeles; Ethan Swope in Pasadena, California; Hallie Golden in Seattle; Mark Thiessen in Anchorage, Alaska; Heather Hollingsworth in Mission, Kansas; Jeff Martin in Atlanta; Janie Har in San Francisco; Brian Melley in London; Kathy McCormack in Concord, New Hampshire; Sarah Brumfield in Cockeysville, Maryland; and Tammy Webber in Detroit contributed.